Cairo property sector on the rebound

House prices in the most upmarket suburbs of Cairo are rocketing as the Egyptian capital starts to recover after years of unrest and economic downturn. File Photo: Cairo skyline, Egypt.

House prices in the most upmarket suburbs of Cairo are rocketing as the Egyptian capital starts to recover after years of unrest and economic downturn.

Villa prices in the well-heeled suburb of Sixth of October, to the south-west of the metropolis, rose by 9 per cent during the three months to the end of December, driving up villa prices in the area by 22 per cent during last year as a whole, JLL reported.

At the same time, villa prices in the equally upmarket New Cairo suburb, close to Cairo International Airport, rose 4 per cent during the final quarter of last year, pushing up sales prices for the year by 30 per cent.

Apartment prices in Sixth of October also increased slightly, by 2 per cent during the quarter, contributing to a year-on-year increase of 15 per cent.

And apartment prices in New Cairo rose 14 per cent during the year, helped by a fourth-quarter increase of 2 per cent.

Meanwhile, rents in the two districts, the main ones monitored by JLL in the city, also showed strong year-on-year increases.

In New Cairo, JLL said that apartment rents rose 9 per cent over the year, while villa rents were up by 20 per cent.

However, in Sixth of October, although apartment rents rose 31 per cent during the year, villa rents remained flat.

JLL predicted that the city’s prime housing market would strengthen further this year as the comparatively stable political and economic outlook combined with a lack of new stock will push up prices.

The company said that although more than 15,000 homes were completed during the final quarter of the year, this represented only 40 per cent of the total units that had been scheduled for completion as hundreds of properties started by smaller developers remained stalled.

“With confidence returning to the market, developers are now more able to progress with stalled projects, and the high level of delays witnessed in recent years is therefore likely to decline,” said Ayman Sami, the head of JLL’s Egypt office.

Egypt’s property market is attracting UAE developers to the country. This week it emerged that the Emaar chairman, Mohamed Alabbar, is pressing ahead with plans to revive an Abu Dhabi-backed push into North Africa and the Levant through the private property company Eagle Hills.

And Dubai-listed Arabtec is planning to build a million low-cost homes over five years on 13 plots of land owned by the Egyptian armed forces.

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